Author Archives: Carmel Bands

No Limits to Training

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Marching Band is a Sport. First things first, marching band is an endurance sport and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.  Endurance, endurance, endurance.  This will be the main focus of everything that you will need to do.  Back when I was marching I got my hands on a pretty accurate GPS unit just to see how far I marched during a given rehearsal.  I was pretty amazed to find out after rehearsal was over that in a one hour visual rehearsal I had marched something like 2 miles.  Now, multiply that by many typical summer rehearsal schedules and you can easily be marching 5-10 miles a day, everyday, in the sun, oh and it will probably be pretty hot out.  I don’t know about you but if you asked me to go outside today and march around for 10 miles in 90+ degree weather I would probably pass out.  So keeping this in mind you need to get your body ready for long term muscle usage…

I am fond of my days in NROTC at Notre Dame and nothing was more motivating than staff sergeant running laps around us while we were trying to get better at running.  While straight up military methods are not necessarily the best approach to marching instruction, the parallels are still there.  In many respects, the fitness and health of the students is the marching staff’s responsibility so getting in shape is great for everyone.  The students will be more likely to respond to running exercises during the season if they are led by the staff than if the staff is simply ordering the students to run around while they watch.  So it’s time to motivate and lead by example starting now.

Chris Mader – Dynamic Marching

Stay Hungry…

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Carmel High School Winter Guard is bringing home the world championship trophy for their performance of Stay Foolish, Stay Hungry.

Their methods are hardly foolish, and they are surrounded by too many supportive families to ever have to go hungry.  But their interpretation of the show was the driving force in achieving their goal, and in teaching others the message through their movements.

A united team of 34 girls backed by families making costumes, nursing injuries and cheering them through struggles went into last week’s world finals undefeated.  They’d been there three times before, but this year they had something different.  They had a pattern of what life is about, and they were there to express it through music and artful athleticism.

They had perfected their performance with practice and successful performances, but the true perfection came from high school girls, most not even 18, already understanding life while remembering it is something we won’t have one day.

Their inspiration came from Steve Jobs’ commencement speech titled “Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish” at Stanford University.  The beginning of his speech said, “Life is about finding how the dots connect, trusting they will connect and understanding you can only see their connection by looking backward.”

He said he was only there to tell three stories about love, life, and death.  Like many, he had experienced all three by age 40, and it took that to learn how the dots in his life were connected.  A group of 15-18 year olds’ united passion for winter guard and trust in one another has brought out an old soul in all of them, making a group of teens wise beyond their years and more grateful for their shared experiences and ambitious teamwork than a trophy.

Lisa Dye’s freshman daughter is on the team and she says the leadership and commitment the girls have for each other has made a tremendous impact on her daughter.

“When you’re on a team or in a family, you’re reminded there’s something bigger than yourself and with that comes opportunities to be accountable to yourself and to other people,” Dye said.  “My daughter joined the team as a little girl and now, in just one year, she’s matured into a young woman.”

Her 15-year-old daughter, Emily says she sees life with different eyes since her very first performance with the team.

“I was nervous for the first one and it didn’t go great; there were things I could’ve done better, but the older members were encouraging us throughout our entire performance, they gave us the chance to believe in ourselves,” Emily said.

Emily said when she first started she only knew two people on the team, and she was still trying to learn how to budget her time with her family, homework and intense practices.  But it was the older girls’ dedication to believing in her that made her not give up.

“We’d go through hard times while being exhausted from the intense training; sometimes it felt like it wasn’t going anywhere,” Emily said.  “Now, to have the chance to look back and see what we did and how rewarding it is to see this kind of ending is a really cool feeling.  It has really taught me when you’re working hard with a group people we can do anything together and that makes us want to work even harder now.”

At just 15, she and the rest of the team see deeper than the surface shimmer of their world championship trophy.  Like any winning team, they have a sense of pride seeing Carmel High School next to world champions, but when one of them sees their reflection in their trophy’s golden sheen, they see a team that was able to connect the dots.  They see 34 girls capable of embracing each others’ pasts while finding the dots in all of their lives.

After, they strapped on their all black costumes with one white line to symbolize the line that connects each member’s dots so audiences can see how a team trusting each other can lead to finding the true pattern of life.

Like Steve Jobs said, it’s all about looking backward to see your dots so you can move forward to connect them.

One of the team’s youngest members thought the same way when she held the trophy:

“Having the chance to look back and see what we came from is what made winning amazing,” Emily said.

By Lindsay Eckert Current in Carmel

Reprinted with permission, Current Publishing, LLC, copyright 2011.

Color Guard

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During the fall Marching Band Season, the Carmel H.S. Color Guard is a performance group that accompanies the Marching Band during the competitive band season by being the “visual music”.  We twirl and spin flags, rifles, sabers, props and dance to interpret the music and drill formations on the football field during competitions and half time at football games.

This year the CHS Marching Band & Color Guard will travel to New York City to perform at the 2011 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.

WINTER GUARD SEASON:

The second half of the school year we participate in an activity called “Winter Guard” which takes all the skills we begin to learn over the Fall and takes it to the next level. Winter Guard is for the color guard only and doesn’t involve the band, which makes it twice as fun for the girls to shine in their own spotlight. The winter guard season is the pinnacle of our year giving the girls the opportunity to compete on a global level as opposed to just the national level during band season. We perform indoors to taped music, which is another bonus of the winter guard season!

The Carmel H.S. Winter Guard are the 2011 Indiana State Champions & the 2011 WGI World Champions!!!

Members of the color guard will not only be taught all of the physical skills of color guard, they will also learn valuable lessons that they can take with them for the rest of their lives. Some of these lessons include: self-esteem, discipline, team building, responsibility, hard work, self-confidence, and having fun by applying these things for the common goal of being “GREAT” at something!!!

Eagleson Landscaping Offer

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Eagleson Landscape would like to help you send your Marching Greyhound to New York City for the 2011 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade! For all services over $500, Eagleson Landscape will rebate 10% of your invoice (pre-tax) to the CHS Band Boosters to go towards your Marching Greyhound’s trip fee. Eagleson’s will even honor your referrals to help send your Marching Greyhound to NYC! Click Eagleson Landscape for more information!

Congratulations Winter Guard!

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Carmel Winter Guard at Finals

Congratulations to the 2011 Carmel Winter Guard for placing first at the WGI World Championships in Dayton, Ohio.

The Guard builds on it’s excellence.…winning the Mid-South Color Guard Regional in Nashville, TN and State prior to that!  The Guard’s scor­ing in the finals was very impres­sive. It was a beat­i­ful show.  Titled “Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish!”

Missed the show?  Check out the video of the Guard at the WGI competition: Carmel WGI Video

The show is based on a commencement speech given by Steven Jobs at Stanford University in 2005.  Steven said that there are three major stages in your life.  One of them is work.  Work will fill a large part of your life and the only way to be truly satisfied is to work hard.

Well, the 2011 Carmel Winter Guard took that idea to heart and work hard…they did.  And the results?  Well, we can be assured that they are “truly satisfied” with their efforts.

“Carmel has the hunger, and it shows in this visual interpretation of Steve Jobs’ 2005 commencement address that urged graduates to “find what you love.” These students love color guard, love performance, and they spread that hunger from end-to-end in one of the season’s most provocative and engaging presentations. Ignore one directive, however: it would be foolish to discount this up-and-coming Indiana valedictorian.” David G. Hill, Mid South Color Guard Review, WGI

 

WGI Finals Score & Placement

1.  Carmel 97.1
2.  James Logan (CA) 95.45
3.  Flana­gan (FL) 93.9
4.  Avon (IN) 92.45

Color Guard

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When I was in high school, I found one of my director’s greatest flaws to be that he had no clue about the color guard.  It’s not that he didn’t care, he just didn’t know any of the technical details about guard work. Then in college I made a observation.  Music Education majors were required to take courses in all the major wind instruments, percussion, strings, and a class on how to run a marching band. I noticed that there was no “color guard techniques” class offered. Being an educator in Texas, I found this to be a great void in my education. Color guard should be a top priority for bands all over the country for this simple reason:

If you’re lucky enough to have the budget for a designated color guard instructor, what do you do when this staff member is absent?  It may be that the instructor is unreliable or even just sick.  And it always seems to happen right before a show weekend.  If this happens, will you sit in your tower and ignore the guard?  Of course you don’t want to do that.  They need help, they need direction just like every other section of your band.  If your percussion instructor is out sick, you’d be prepared to give feedback and critiques to your percussion section.  So, the same thing needs to happen for guard.  Otherwise you are destined to lose valuable rehearsal time with a key element of your program.

The solution?  Education, of course!  I saw the need for this skill set before I graduated high school and attended a summer camp on learning guard.  To this day I keep up with the latest trends and techniques from friends of mine during little “private lessons.”  I would suggest doing this as often as you can!

You have a guard instructor, or at least you know someone who teaches guard.  So go learn from them!  Learn your drop spins, carves, tosses, and movement.  It doesn’t take much time to just get a basic understanding of the proper technique for a drop spin or a jazz run.  It’s all about knowing the language so that you can communicate effectively with your membership.

A small amount of time in this caption can go a long way in all levels and sizes of programs.  Your staff will thank you, the judges will notice, and most importantly you will have the respect and attention of your guard.  This is an amazing return for a few hours of work!

Jason Hodges

Used with permission, Dynamic Marching

Alliance for Indiana Music Education

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The Alliance for Indiana Music Education representing the following organizations: Indiana Music Educators Association, Indiana State School Music Association, Indiana Bandmasters Association, Indiana High School Color Guard Association, Indiana Choral Director’s Association, Indiana Percussion Association, Indiana Chapter of the American String Teachers Association, and the Indiana Orff-Schulwerk Association encourages parents of the more than one million public school students served by these organizations to ask their legislators to vote NO to legislation that will result in school corporations being forced to reduce or eliminate music and arts education programs.

Download an important message from the Alliance for Indiana Music Education explaining how a current bill in the state legislature could adversely affect your student’s music education.

November, 2010 Band Banquet

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We would like to make this page, your page.  The topic is Fun and Friendship.  Tell us about your Band experiences…what you liked, what you didn’t, how your band experience has shaped your life.  Did anything funny happen?  Send us your pictures….Let the band family know!

“When I was first entering Carmel High School as a freshman. the number one thing that was most often told to me to ensure that I would have a wonderful high school experience was to get involved. Everyone from my GKOM (freshman mentor), to my teachers, to principal John Williams himself, told me the same thing; you have to get involved in some sort of activity. I was very thankful to already know what my high school involvement would be.  The Carmel Marching Greyhounds.  I was very fortunate to be one of the few kids that had the opportunity to join marching band as an eighth grader, and I have been a proud member of marching band ever since. This group allowed me to feel at home in a school with so many kids, that you begin to feel like a number on a roster, rather than a student.  I had found my home, my family away from home, the people I never got tired of seeing (which is shocking, since we spent so much time together). It was not all fun and games though; it was hard work, and taught me how to achieve excellence; not just in band, but in all aspects of life. Marching band taught me to pursue my dreams, and I will be starting to pursue these dreams this upcoming fall when I head off to college.”

-anonymous

             “Wherever you go, go with your heart.” This means to me believing in everything you do. Part of believing is dedicating yourself whole-heartedly to the task at hand, never doing something halfway or leaving the job unfinished.  For example, that includes giving back to the group that gave me so much, Carmel Bands. My junior year, I had braces and made Jazz 4, a humbling experience. However, this gave me the opportunity to give back by teaching, encouraging, and mentoring the mostly underclassmen group to learn to play jazz at the high school level and feel a successful part of it. After Jazz a la mode, Mr. Saucedo, our Jazz 4 director, surprised me by saying that I had really helped the freshman develop into better players. As Shakespeare said, “Passion is catching.” If you go with your heart, as I did in Jazz 4 that year, you’ll be pleasantly surprised where it leads.

-anonymous

“I learned and gained so much from my experiences in marching band. In breaking out of my shell and taking leadership, I got my first job.  The job that I really wanted and I still work at today. If I hadn’t participated in marching band my senior year, there’s no way I would have that job.  I’m more outgoing all around, and I’m not afraid to strike up a conversation with someone I don’t know. I gained people skills, and in doing so, figured out what I want to major in college.”

-anonymous

“The marching band program at Carmel High School has always stressed the idea of being a highly productive and efficient individual. Whether we are learning an entire competition show or we’re just going over one individual measure of music, the manner that we go about things is always systematic and orderly. That same concept has transferred into my academic career as well. Working on assignments and projects takes order, time management, and hard work. The Carmel High School marching band is a nationally acclaimed group that not only stresses perfection, but also the idea of impeccable work ethic.”

-anonymous

“As a freshman I was talked into joining marching band, and as I expected, or perhaps because I expected to, I hated it. It was a lot of hard work. To my surprise, right in the middle of band season, I started loving it. I became aware that I was a part of something bigger. We band members became united by common struggles and common goals. Not only did I realize that I needed others to reach these goals, but I also learned that they needed me just as much. So my first lessons learned in marching band were of commitment, teamwork, persistence and confidence. I was depended upon and it was a good feeling that I didn’t want to lose.”

-anonymous

“Another group that has been highly influential in my high school career is the marching band. There is so much to say about this group that I can’t even begin to fit it onto two pages, but there is one thing that every student should take away from such an experience. Marching band is where you learn how to turn a normal group of people into a family….The drill and the music are starting to fade from our minds, but our sense of being together is still as vibrant as the day the season ended.”

-anonymous

“I learned through band, as cliche as it sounds, if you follow your dreams, you will be rewarded.  In band, all 200 plus of us followed our dreams, and we were rewarded. It may not have been with a first place at nationals, but it was with making friends that will last a life time. The rehearsals may not have always been fun, but we were rewarded with the satisfaction of performing a show that at first seemed too  impossible to complete.  We were also rewarded with the skills, and knowledge needed to succeed in life, like the knowledge that shooting for the stars, and going after your dreams will take you far in your life; even if taking the first steps seem a little daunting.”

-anonymous

“I am confident that all of the life lessons learned in band will help me as I follow my dream to be a positive influence in young people’s lives. The role model of the organization of directors, parents, and students striving for excellence will be something that I can draw upon for the rest of my life. I thank all of those involved for the opportunities that their work and dedication afforded to me.”

-anonymous

“I have found that only by coming together can the whole be more than the sum of its individual parts. For example, when the band, guard, and drumline finally come together to perform, after hours of separate preparation, the resulting synergy resonates throughout the stadium, raises the hair on the back of your neck, makes your eyes water, and your heart pump harder.”

-anonymous

“Participating in the marching band has turned me into a well rounded individual and I have gained lots of life lessons. I will never forget my time in the marching band, nor be grateful enough to have worked in one of the best bands in the country.   Carmel Marching Band will always be, in my heart, the grand champion out of all the bands; maybe not because we’re the best, but because we’ve achieved excellence. “

-anonymous

“Hendrich Heine once said, “When words leave off, music begins.” The more time I spent in the Carmel Marching Band the more I began to believe that music conveys the emotion that words never could convey. I did not understand the magic and majesty of music before I came to Carmel, but I soon felf in love with the musical expression through marching band.”

-anonymous

“I came to Cannel from a very small private school. At the first meeting in April I had no idea what to expect. Since I had never been to a public school and always wore a uniform to school, I had no idea what to wear. When my Mom dropped me off that day in April. I had three or four extra outfits, and around five or six different pairs of shoes in the car just in case I was not wearing the right type of clothes. When I think about that today I just chuckle. I was so nervous that day and had no idea what to expect. I was intimidated at first by the task at hand, and I thought marching and playing at the same time was impossible.

I came to the marching band program years behind everyone else in music education. My (former) school band teacher did not really teach any of the fundamentals of music or of my instrument. So I spent all four years playing catch-up on my instrument. I was never the best player, but I always tried my best.  I had enough enthusiasm of four people and was very dedicated to marching band.”

-anonymous

“I have devoted myself to giving back to the band I love. I have spent the last 2 years doing the best I could to be the best role model I could be for the band…I tried to live up the expectations of others as well as the expectations I had for myself. It was never easy.  I put in a tremendous amount of time and I did my very best to form personal connections and friendships with everyone I could.

-anonymous”

“One of the most magnificent ideas is that music conveys what feelings sound like. I have come to believe this ideal with every fiber of my being. Music conveys what words never could. I am dedicating my life to make a difference in the world and plan on helping as many people as I can…”

-anonymous

I would like to thank the directors for giving me the opportunity to join and participate in the best marching band in the country. I have been honored to have had the opportunity to serve the band. Marching band is an experience I will always remember and I will cherish it with all my heart.

-anonymous